Quarantined

[SteveS]

The whole of Italy is now in lockdown, initially until 3 April.  The province of Asti, where we live, was put into lockdown on Sunday morning.  We have supplies and some good wines in store. 

And I have plenty of great tunes to learn - so I'd better get on with them.  One of things I'm looking to do is work more on rhythmic, chordal and harmony accompaniment to songs and Nordic folk tunes during this lockdown period.  Plus there are other tunes that I'm sharing with a fiddler friend - we're planning to have regular Skype sessions and tune swaps.

Shame I haven't got my workshop here - it's still in storage in UK - I have plenty of restoration jobs to get on with.

 

#IoRestoACasa

Edited March 15, 2020 by SteveS

[Susanne]

Sounds like your time in lockdown will be well spent!

[Sunbeamer]

They say a man needs a project, sounds like you have one , plus the right attitude!

all the best to you 

[David Barnert]

We’re not on lockdown or quarantine here, but we might as well be. Everything’s closed or cancelled. I haven’t been out of the house all day (Saturday) and any plans I had for tomorrow have vanished.

[Geoff Wooff]

Almost total  isolation  here in France,  having not come into close contact  with  anyone  for  more than  two  weeks ,  my wife  has made one shopping  trip.   In a  neighbouring  country  , I  am  told  , there was  a gathering  last weekend,  of   a large number  of    concertina players  in a small hotel, perhaps  not a sensible  idea.

Edited March 16, 2020 by Geoff Wooff

[gcoover]

Bagpipe, bodhran, banjo and accordion players should already be accustomed to social distancing (if all the jokes are to be believed), but hopefully not us concertina players!

 

But to make the best of a bad situation, it does present an opportunity to hunker down and play and learn more tunes. A musical quarantine could end up being a very positive thing.

 

Do you think being sucked into a concertina and chopped up by free reeds would do the virus in? If so, here's our chance to save the world!

 

 

Gary

[Peter Laban]

As a sort of last chance saloon we went to a concert at the Corofin trad fest last Friday week, no concertinas involved, Liz and Yvonne Kane, Tony Linnane and Danny O'Mahoney provided some nice music. Hand sanitisers provided at the venue. Before the concert we did go into a pub  for a cup of tea and listened to the session in progress had brief chats with  Caoilfhionn ní Frighil and Aoife Kelly (to add some concertina related content) and ran into Steve Chambers after. We've been mostly in shut down since, two shopping trips and coffee after aside.

Digging in for the foreseeable I suppose.  On sunday all sports coverage on tv had been replaced by half decent movies and (trad) music programming, which suits me.

 

Interesting times indeed.

 

[Tina]

Hi Steve and all (quarantined or not),

 

after I came across an early Noel Hill youtube video, I'm on a 'corona project'. That is, to learn 'Master Crowley's' in F minor... yes, on my regular C-G Jeffrey's.

Imagine the confusion when all your push-pull patterns seem to be turned upside down. But after all, we're in times of social distance

 

Tina (stuck home)

 

 

[JimLucas]

I was on a train in Sweden (on my way to Stockholm to perform for the St. Patrick's Day weekend) when I learned that Denmark had just closed its borders, with no advance warning.  Then I learned that the "temporary" closure is scheduled to end on April 13.  "Oh boy, they'll let me return home on my birthday!"  (That's also Easter this year, which I suspect is the real reason for the choice of date.)  I eventually was able to learn that those with a significant reason -- e.g., trucks full of food and Danish legal residents -- would be allowed to enter.  So tomorrow I return home as scheduled, where I intend to keep myself isolated while I watch how things develop.  Luckily, I have a habit of keeping a supply of non-perishable food on hand.

 

My reasons for personal isolation aren't just to protect myself, but even more to protect others.  It has been confirmed that a person can become infected and then pass the virus to others before any symptoms appear.  So conceivably, I could be exposed without knowing it, then pass the virus to someone else -- even a stranger in a supermarket -- who would unwittingly pass it on to a fragile friend or relative who could die from it.  I don't want to take that chance.

 

Meanwhile, I just learned that my sister in the US and several members of the chorus she sings with have come down with indefinite symptoms.  Flu or corona?  They don't know, and so far haven't been able to get tested.  They have no idea who brought the infection into their group, much less where from.  This is how it spreads... when you don't see it coming... or going from yourself.

 

Keep safe... and keep others safe.

[Anglo-Irishman]

7 hours ago, JimLucas said:

My reasons for personal isolation aren't just to protect myself, but even more to protect others.  It has been confirmed that a person can become infected and then pass the virus to others before any symptoms appear.  So conceivably, I could be exposed without knowing it, then pass the virus to someone else -- even a stranger in a supermarket -- who would unwittingly pass it on to a fragile friend or relative who could die from it.  I don't want to take that chance.

Jim,

I think this is a very good, responsible  attitude! Good luck to you and all Cnetters, wherever you may be. We're all in this together!

Cheers,

John

[RWL]

Here in Pennsylvania, the governor has asked all non-essential businesses to close for 2 weeks.  Only grocery stores, pharmacies and gas stations are supposed to be open.  Restaurants closed - only food places selling take out are allowed. Gyms closed. No gatherings of more than 10 people is what they're recommending.  It was hard on the bars which had to be closed for St Patrick's day - one of their biggest commercial times.  I haven't left the house to go anywhere for two days, but my wife has to pick up our grandchildren for child care, so she's been back and forth to town.  She said there are fewer cars on the road.  People have gone nuts buying toilet paper, cleaning products and canned goods so there are a lot of bare spots on store shelves.  The stores have finally put limits on how much people can buy so that there is enough product for everyone.  They say delivery trucks are still working.  The local big hospital in our rural area just announced this evening that they've had their first 3 positive tests for people in our area.  I have been playing my concertina as well as my violin and viola.

[Anglo-Irishman]

Hi, @RWL, here in Baden-Württemberg, Germany, our regional government has put very similar restrictions in place. So St. Patricks's Day didn't happen here, either! And here it's the toilet-paper and pasta shelves that are empty. In France, I believe, it's red wine and condoms - but that may just be a rumour!

 

One difference here, though: grandparents and grandchildren are advised to keep apart, even more so than adult acquaintances.

 

Cheers,

John.

[JimLucas]

11 minutes ago, Anglo-Irishman said:

One difference here, though: grandparents and grandchildren are advised to keep apart, even more so than adult acquaintances.

 

Yes.  With flu and other "recent" epidemics, both the elderly and children are "high risk" categories, tending on average to suffer more severely than others.  With covid-19, children are not (on average) suffering more than other age groups.  But this means that they could be ill but not obviously so, and thus pass the virus to doting grandparents who are at high risk.

 

Keeping "social distance" means with everybody... as much as possible, and not just as much as is "comfortable".  The virus can't tell whether someone is a family member or not.

[JimLucas]

33 minutes ago, Anglo-Irishman said:

And here it's the toilet-paper and pasta shelves that are empty. In France, I believe, it's red wine and condoms - but that may just be a rumour!

 

This is interesting, but also a bit frightening.  The extreme version of the herd mentality:  One or a few individuals panic for no reason, and suddenly there's a stampede, with everyone running, and none bothering to wonder why, or even where.

 

A brother and sister in the US say there's no toilet paper to be had anywhere near where either of them lives.  They're OK, because they have a habit of keeping a "backup" supply on hand.  Apartment dwellers who have never felt that they had the space for such a "luxury" must be really worried right now.

 

However, in Denmark and Sweden there seems to be no shortage of toilet paper in any of the stores.  The only shortage of anything that I noticed in my brief socially-distanced trip out today (to fill small gaps in my good-for-a-month larder) was in the organic meat section of one store, but that has happened occasionally before, even long before this virus.

[Roger Hare]

10 hours ago, JimLucas said:

...in the US say there's no toilet paper to be had anywhere near where either of them lives...

Here in the UK, judging by the amount of loo-paper I see being hauled home from the supermarkets,

I can only presume that all the home freezers in the UK are packed to the gunn'ls with the stuff...

 

The peculiar thing is that some of the smaller, (low-end?) retailers seem to be OK - shorter queues, with

most (admittedly not all) commodities available in reasonable quantities - odd? The business model for

some of these retailers is a bit strange - the continuity of supplies of x, y, or z is often a bit patchy as a

matter of course, and as far as I can see, that hasn't changed much, but they seem to be meeting their

customer's needs quite successfully...

Edited March 19, 2020 by lachenal74693

[RAc]

actually, the real absurdity is that in a true emergency situation, one of the last things one will need to stack up on is toilet paper. At least as long as there is fresh water, and if there is not, toilet paper is the least thing to worry about.

 

The German newspapers currently cover every minute detail of the C crisis, and psychological analyses of what and why people stack is a considerable percentage of that coverage. Human nature in all of its facets... ?

[Geoff Wooff]

Total  Isolation.   Sounds like a great  chance to  practice -  learn some new  tunes.... hmmmm!   Shame, I  work at  home  !  Well then , a great  chance to  get on with my work without  disturbance.

[Peter Laban]

I popped to the shops this morning and was surprised at the relative normality I found. It was definitely quiet but the Supermarket had fully stocked shelves, social distancing protocols and contactless payments only. No mad buying, just a few elderly ladies and mountainy men getting a bit of early morning shopping. Shops and cafés appeared mostly open and people were building things and working on the road. A gorgeous spring day at last,  for a little while things looked less bleak than I know they are.